Maggody and the Moonbeams

Written by Joan Hess

Narrated by CJ Critt

A youth trip turns deadly, and Chief of Police Arly Hanks must catch the killer while serving as chaperone, in this hilarious small-town mystery.

Arly Hanks has caught all sorts of killers since she returned home to Maggody, Arkansas, population 759, but she's never tangled with anyone as devious as the local youth group. While chaperoning a trip to Camp Pearly Gates, Arly watches the kids as closely as she would any hardened criminal, but when teenagers have a mind to get into trouble, there's nothing a police chief can do but limit the damage. She's just about got the situation under control when one of the kids finds a body, and all hell breaks loose in classic Maggody manner.

The murdered woman sports a shaved head and a white robe, marking her as a Moonbeam, a member of a particularly kooky local cult. And caught between the sect and the law, Arly may be forced to sacrifice what little sanity she has left.

Nobody pokes fun at religion quite as effectively as Joan Hess. This is another laugh-out-loud entry in one of the funniest mystery series of all time.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Highbridge Company
• Release date: Feb 20, 2024
• ISBN: 9781696614825

Joan Hess

Joan Hess was the author of the Claire Malloy Mysteries and the Arly Hanks Mysteries, formally known as the Maggody Mysteries. She was a winner of the American Mystery Award and the Agatha Award (for which she was nominated five times), a member of Sisters in Crime, and a former president of the American Crime Writers League. She died in November 2017, four months after the publication of The Painted Queen.